As most things start, it started with a feeding.
There was a lovely dark-haired woman waiting for them at Mel’s feeding room, handpicked by Elora just as every other night since she joined Mel in her travels a few years prior. It didn’t have to be, but girls went missing all the time and forgotten when the next one disappeared. Her mother had taught her well.
Once the girl was a corpse on her expensive bed, Mel took a luxurious bath and sat with her thoughts about the two scientists she had met a couple of years back. Viktor, whose sickly disposition would make him a weak-willed vampire, and Jayce, whose sensibilities would make a terrible vampire as well. But they had burrowed under her skin and Mel wanted . She wanted to be selfish and keep them for her.
She wondered if there was any chance they’d be willing to take the bite when a crashing sound made her turn her head in the direction of the door.
“Gentlemen, you better not make a mess you can’t pay back. Her Lady is busy at the moment. You’d be better off leaving her alone.”
The servant’s voice carried through the hallway, making Mel roll her eyes. She was cruel by nature, but she had learned early on to control her rage, meaning most of her servants had never seen her lose control. They didn’t know to truly fear her. Maybe she should change that.
Elora’s voice cut through her thoughts, “let them in, Arahí. I’ll deal with them.” There’s some shuffling around until Elora speaks again. “What happened to him?”
“Lost control of a robotics experiment. I found him bleeding out on the floor. I thought maybe—”
I found him bleeding out.
Mel sighed and got out of the bath, walking towards the commotion. As she walked —her bare feet trailing water behind her, silent on the hallway floor—, she took a deep breath and found herself surrounded by the smell of fresh blood, blood still coming out of the pale man in front of her.
“Viktor.” It was a whisper, but it rang like a shot in the silence of the hallway. The only other sound, Viktor’s labored breathing as he bled out on her carpet.
“Mel! I know I have nothing to offer you but please, he cannot die like this. This wasn’t supposed to happen, I was supposed to be there. I, I–”
Jayce’s words faded as he took in Mel’s naked form in front of him.
“I was busy, Jayce.”
“It was urgent,” he replied before swallowing.
“So you want a mercy killing? Is that it? Couldn’t have done it yourself?”
Jayce’s face took on a paler shade at that comment. “I thought– they say vampire blood can cure illness. Bring someone back from the brink of death.”
“And you think, your friend here would like that?”
“I was the one who suggested it,” Viktor croaked from the place he’s collapsed next to a chair —trust Elora to mind Mel’s carpets. At least, someone in this household had any sensibility.
“Ah, he lives!” and though her exclamation was sarcastic, she was relieved. She didn’t want to let these boys go yet. “In my 300 years many have wanted me to sire them, but I haven’t taken on any of them. You know why?” —she paused for a moment, but didn’t give them time to reply before she continued— “it’s because no one’s ever interested me enough.
“You two, however– I can think of a few ways to spend the next couple of decades.”
“So you will help Viktor?”
“Ah, here I thought you two were a matched set,” she smiled, knowing her smile has been described as the real killer, not the fangs retracted into her mouth.
“You also want to take me?” Jayce asked.
“You better make up your mind, Viktor’s heart is beating erratically. He hasn’t got long.”
“Whatever it takes,”Jayce said.
Mel walked towards the two men, stopping next to Viktor, gently touching his shoulder to make him look up. “You have to want it.”
“I want it,” Viktor said, decisive, leaving no room for discussion.
Mel’s fangs grew in her mouth until they thickened and doubled in size, perfect for her to tear into the skin of her wrist to open a gash across her veins. She lowered into a crouch —drawing a gasp from Jayce, who’d just got an eyeful of her naked body— and offered the blood to Viktor, who opened his mouth and greedily drank from it. He was not repulsed by the blood dripping down his chin and Mel took it as a win, maybe she’d still make a fairly decent vamp out of him.
She knows the exact moment the blood starts to take into him when he grabs her hand and sinks his own human teeth deeper, drinking from Mel with abandon. Once he’s drunk his fill, he let go of Mel, whose wrist quickly started to heal now that it’s not being drained.
“Thank you,” Viktor said, sitting straight.
“You’ll thank me later, Viktor.”
For a moment, neither of them moves, still mesmerized by the intimacy of sharing blood. Mel can see the color coming back to his cheeks, but without inspecting the wound, she can’t know for sure how bad the accident was.
“Let me look at you,” she said.
Viktor moved his shirt up, showing the still gaping gash that ran across his stomach. If Jayce had been a minute later, it would have been too late.
“You’ll heal faster after you die properly. Later tonight, my dear.”
Standing from her crouch, she took Jayce in and saw the mild horror in his face, her still elongated fangs dragging her words to drive the point home. “If you still wish to be like me, you have to understand that this is nothing: you will see violence beyond what you can imagine. You will inflict some of that violence upon the world yourself. And you will live to see your bloodline die.” She walked until she was in front of him, barely a few inches separating them. “Do you still want it?”
“Yes.”
With a smile, she tore her left wrist open and offered it to him.
Jayce drank.